For many companies, one of the most important business processes is the movement of goods through a manufacturing process or supply chain/distribution network. To track the movement of goods, electronic tags may be affixed or otherwise integrated with the goods. These tags are typically in the form of a small chip and implemented using a family of technologies that facilitate the transfer of data wirelessly between tagged goods and electronic readers.
Radio frequency identification (RFID) tags are one example of such electronic tags. RFID tags have small radio antennas which are capable of transmitting data over a short range to RFID readers. In a typical RFID system, the RFID tag contains a memory chip that stores a unique identifier for a product with which it is associated. When an RFID tag passes through the range of the RFID reader, the RFID reader reads the product identifier from the memory of the RFID tag. By placing RFID readers at various locations within a supply chain/distribution network, it is possible to track the movement of the tagged items through the network by gathering the product identifiers accumulated by the various RFID readers.